


Girl

by Jeannyboy



Category: Original Work
Genre: F/M, Original work - Freeform, Short Story, and it won me twenty bucks so, chautauqua entry 2018, good therapy, third place, this was rage written after my ex broke up with me this passed March
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-17
Updated: 2018-08-17
Packaged: 2019-06-28 20:35:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,938
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15714624
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jeannyboy/pseuds/Jeannyboy
Summary: After Mick sees his ex girlfriend on the big screen after 6 years of silence, he becomes obsessed and falls in love with her all over again. He doesn't think he'll ever speak to her again in reality but when her parents' anniversary brings her back to town, he has one chance to do what's right.





	Girl

**Author's Note:**

> Title reference: Beck- Girl

            The first time he saw her in six years, he almost did a spit take right there in the theater. His wife was curled into the seat haphazardly, her face pressed against his shoulder as she smiled at the couple on screen. There was love in her eyes and a sigh in her chest as she ignored the way her husband stared at the screen with disbelief so tangible, it felt like all the breath had left his lungs.

            On screen, her face was more angular than years before, allowing her the ability to not look like a child with the severe pixie cut her character possessed. Her skin was darker, something only time and careful exposure to the elements had brought about. It took him another moment, breaking the safe he'd cataloged all of the memories containing her into; but one close up of those eyes had him reeling.

            He'd never been poetic; she'd actually argued with him once that he didn't have a romantic bone in his body, but he'd made her sigh one night as they had lain together, sweaty and content, as he told her how her eyes looked like lightning; fierce and wild, blue at the edges, collapsing to the color of nothing in the center.

            It was those eyes he'd only had to see once to know in an instant that she'd done it. In a world where they'd fought constantly about their dreams, how he was working to achieve his and all she did was waste time making faces in the mirror, she'd surpassed him. She'd won and he'd lost. She was living a hundred lives like she said she would and he was stuck in a musty theater seat in a town so close to the desert she'd once said that the dust that blew in from the wastelands were the forgotten dreams the locals had thrown to the wind.

            Until that moment, he'd thought himself content. He had a wife and a son-both of which had come earlier in life than expected-and he was the head chef at the nicest restaurant in town. People came from towns over to taste his food, a lie he'd told himself to escape the crushing reality; that the town they lived in was simply the biggest within the surrounding 50 mile radius and was of course the place boys took their girlfriends to impress them after scrounging around the couch for change and mowing drought browned lawns just to scrape up enough money to pay for the gas for the trip.

            So for the next 90 minutes, all Mick could do was revisit the memories he’d long ago locked away; as hazy with age as the sky was with dust. He watched the woman on screen as she demanded the attention of the protagonist, couldn’t help but imagine that it was him she was trying to win over, heart hammering. Mick watched, pulse hitching, when a scene of the two together revealed the rating of the movie, felt his skin tingle as if she were there, dragging manicured nails down his face and over his chest.

            Though he watched her on screen, all Mick saw was the small woman with doe eyes and work weathered hands as he imagined her beside him. Even as she stared back at him through the screen, eyes half-lidded and covered in makeup, he saw the naked skin she’d chosen to wear outside of fancy occasions when she’d get excited to dress up for him.

            Now it was like she was a different person…

            He cast his eyes down as, towards the end, those piercing eyes came too close to the last look she’d ever given him, narrowed in rage but spilling over with pain. The only difference is the night time scene and the fact that the man in the movie runs after her.

            _Of course she’s different. She’s an actress_. The thought comes unwarranted as Mick follows his wife to the car, not hearing her words as she gushes over the movie and the love interest but nodding anyway, his mind preoccupied.

            _She’s living her dream while I’ve given up on mine._

            The thought haunts him as he lies in bed that night, staring restlessly at the ceiling as Celine sighs in her sleep beside him. He forgets to feign sleep as Chase comes tittering into the room in socked feet.

            The sight of his son wrings his heart with feelings too complicated to sort out as he helps the toddler onto the mattress, finally falling asleep with the boy wedged protectively under his arm, his body warm against Mick’s side.

***

            The next few weeks are spent in an obsessive frenzy of research. It consumes him but doesn’t take up every waking moment outside of his own mind; there’s just simply too much already filling his life. He’s head chef, of course his hands are taken up with trying to not add to the Pollock painting of scars his hands are, and at the forefront of his mind is making sure everything he and his team produces is nothing short of the best.

            Which, in itself, isn’t necessarily a challenge in this town. It’s expensive, sure, but easily the best. Mick is talented in the kitchen, that’s something that can’t be denied, but when there’s little more than fast food and dive bars, it’s easy to be the best.

            Except when you can’t get the woman you not only let slip through your fingers, but basically pushed out the door, out of your mind long enough to watch the sharp blade come down with a stinging pain that spells finality for the night.

            He doesn’t cuss, even though he clearly wants to. Having a five year old has broken him of careless curses. He does, however, stomp his foot like a spoiled child and rears back from the counter, shouting at Carson to take over for the night as he presses a dish towel to his hand that rapidly changes from white to red so fast a magician of little skill might be hard pressed not to applaud.

            Mick tries his best not to bleed all over the car as he drives himself to the ER, grunting angrily when his hand slips on the wheel and he can clearly see the ruddy stain glinting in the lamp light.

            The bleeding has subsided by the time he’s sitting in the waiting room, alone with the thoughts that’ve taken roost in his mind since that night at the theater. He waits for two hours, all the while unable to keep himself from seeing her, what used to be her, in his minds eye. He can imagine the petit blonde behind the desk is her, until she turns and her face is too narrow, nose too button-like, her eyes darker than the bourbon he used to drown himself in.

            His fingers itch to tap away at his phone, to search for her, but it’s already covered in blood from sending a text to Celine telling her where he was. There had been a worried response, one that, though he cared, he’d cast off with a simple ‘okay’.

            She’d figure out something was wrong.

            Eventually.

            It was as if, when his relationship with Celine had come about, he’d actively sought out girls that were the exact opposite of Beck. He could instantly tell when it took Celine weeks, or even months, to figure out something that had taken Beck a matter of hours to assess his moods.

            It seems a blessing now.

            So he waits, images of the past and present colliding. He remembered Beck with her blonde hair, being so mad that it never seemed to grow further than her shoulders, griping how much she looked like a teenager instead of the adult she was. Thinking about the shocking red it had been in the movie, so vibrant the character had obviously dyed it, was unsettling. Beck had never wanted to dye her golden hair, knowing how rare true blondes were when entering adulthood. He just couldn’t believe she’d changed so much.

            And her skin, so much darker than the alabaster he’d run his hands over, fascinated with just how translucent it was; tracing her veins with a finger had always made her burst into laughter, more often than not leading to-

            “Michael C. Johnston?”

            Mick is instantly brought back to reality as his name is called. Brought back from the smell of his apartment one rainy Sunday morning to the smell of antiseptic and the throbbing pain that has traveled from his hand to his heart.

 

            “Honey, what happened?” Celine is still awake when he gets home, fresh stitches sealed away beneath a cumbersome bandage that’s hardly unnoticeable.

            Shaking his head, Mick grabs a clean tumbler from the cabinet, having to fish his uninjured hand behind the towers of brightly colored plastic before he finds one. It’d been a while since the last time he’d consumed something stronger than a beer; the thin layer of dust on the cap evidence that he wasn’t the drinker his grandfather had been. It was something that Beck-

            Mick shakes his head after taking a shot of a drink that’s meant to be sipped; a poor attempt at dislodging thoughts and memories that refused to burn away with the alcohol.

            Celine takes his hand, peeking under the bandage with a look that can easily be described as unadulterated _disgust_.

            “Are you alright?” She pats his hand lightly, not enough to hurt, but enough to let him know she’s not leaving until she’s positive that whatever happened wasn’t because of her.

            Mick does his best to smile, to put her at ease. It was something he often did without words because he tended to fail at those. He’d grown quieter over the years. After Beck left without a backwards glance, after his oldest brother had died and his youngest had quit talking to him.

            His wife smiles at him, kissing him with a soft press of lips to his before leaving him to climb back out of his life raft and resume the drowning he’d postponed six years ago.

 

            After calling Carson and appointing him head chef for the day, Mick takes the day off from work. He stays in bed until Celine takes Chase to kindergarten before going to work herself; feigning had quickly become the norm for him over the past few weeks.

            After heating up the coffee Celine had made to jumpstart her day, Mick sits at the counter with his tablet, a gift he rarely used from two Christmas’s before. His right hand is basically useless, the bandages from the night before bulky over his hand and thumb, the search engine thankfully picking up the name after entering her first name.

            Jethra Helena Beckett.

            He sat there a long time after the results had popped up. It was weird seeing her first name, honestly. Mick could remember the first time they’d met, how after a few drinks he’d accidentally called her Rebecca which had morphed into a discussion about names and how weird parents could be. He could remember how she’d slurred a drunken story of how her mother only named her Jethra after her father, Jethro, and had intended for her to go by Helena.

            _“But why would I want to go by the name of a woman who was kidnapped by a jealous man? Whom thousands of men lost their lives just to get her back? No one’s life deserves the death of another.”_ She’d taken a large swig of her Jack and Coke then, her glass connecting with the beer stained bar reminiscent of rolling thunder, before grinning widely. _“I’d rather people be reminded of an artist when meeting me.”_ And just like that, the chorus of her favorite Beck song is stuck in his head, a backdrop of music to the carousel of images bobbing through his thoughts.

            Mick scrolls through the top related articles, not finding much in way of negative tabloids. He finds that she’d achieved things she’d talked about before; donating money, volunteering for nature and community saving projects. There were interviews of past movies she’d starred in that he watched, pathetically, metaphorically salivating over, just to hear her voice and see her smile before he remembered that she wasn’t talking to him and that he should be ashamed of his current actions.

            It doesn’t stop him from learning everything about her that had happened since he’d broken her heart. The only thing that slowed his search was the announcement of her engagement to another actor who certainly looked a great deal different than Mick himself. He was taller by about four inches (which he only found out after a brief search in another window) with wild, dark hair and eyes so bright he could imagine their kids having no pigment at all in their iris’s. The thought warmed his heart for about two seconds before he remembered that her womb was barren and that this man must love her more than his legacy.

            It made him understand the hurt he’d seen in her eyes that night, the barely controlled rage as he’d drunkenly told her he couldn’t be with someone who couldn’t keep his bloodline alive.

            It made him understand that she was right in calling him a selfish asshole before leaving forever.

            Of course he’d given it only a week’s worth of thought before filing her away in the back of his mind with all of the other failed relationships he’d refused to acknowledge that had happened in his life. Anything that had been left at his apartment had been thrown out, mostly by his brother while they’d still been on speaking terms, while he’d constantly avoided places he thought she might be. It had been six years since he’d been back to their shared hometown; unwilling to see the looks on the faces of acquaintances they’d shared, completely destroying any likelihood of him running into one of her parents.

            Until three weeks ago, he hadn’t even known about her career, hadn’t known that she wasn’t still grooming dogs, making the most of small-town life. Which, given his status on how often he actually visits social media, shouldn’t entirely surprise him.

            He ends his search, thinking he’s satisfied, by looking at the ring on her finger in a closeup of the happy couple. It was the one her mother used to wear on her own hand when they’d been together. It meant that they’d been less than fifty miles away from him within the last year and he’d not seen her. He sits back, seemingly content with the fact that she’s just as good at ignoring someone as he is.

 

            It’s another few weeks before Mick’s world is turned upside down yet again. He’s at the grocery store looking through the spice aisle when he hears the intercom crackle and the words “Beckett to the bakery” ring out across the store. He stops, his mind on high alert for the name ever since his trip to the movies had brought her back into his life. With caution, Mick makes his way to the end of the aisle, turns to the right and approaches the bakery counter. He sees no one he recognizes, only the woman behind the display case, smiling, waiting for him to speak, when he hears a name he hasn’t heard in six years.

            “Cal?”

            Beck wasn’t the only one who was once known by a different name. He’d started going by Mick shortly after she’d left; convincing himself it was for professional reasons. Only now realizing the truth behind the lie he’s been feeding himself.

            Mick turns, faster than he’d like to admit, and sees her standing there, looking ordinary in jeans and an old Rancid t-shirt.

            _His_ old Rancid t-shirt.

            He doesn’t know what to expect, had he ever entertained the idea of ever seeing her again, but this was not it.

            He must’ve been staring at her chest, at the blocky letters stretched across her tiny frame on a shirt two sizes too big, because she looks down and the look of disbelief turns to a shy smile, bangs falling in her face and he realizes now that her hair is longer than in the movie and its’ natural color instead of the garish red it had been. “I brought it back to return it but my perfume spilled in my bag and it’s the only one that didn’t completely smell like an Avon rep.”

            Mick smiles, unable to keep himself from doing so at her rambling. She’d always fully explained a situation, even when the situation itself didn’t warrant it. A nervous habit.

            They stand there, neither knowing what to do until the woman in the bakery who called for Beckett repeats herself.

            It gets Beck moving, wrestling her feet from where they’ve rooted themselves to the grimy tile beneath her sneakered feet. She moves passed him, close enough for him to reach out and touch her; avoiding, but not seemingly so.

            He could feel the tension in the air and turns to watch her accept a large, two-tiered cake from the lady with the smile. He watches as they swap money for product and she does her best to lift the cake from the counter. Against his better judgement, Mick rushes forward to take it from her, a nervous smile in exchange for a surprised one from her.

            He realizes now that he hasn’t said a word. Clearing his throat, Mick opens his mouth to, only to be interrupted by Celine as she comes up to him, steering the cart while Chase plays in the toddler seat with the Captain America doll he’d brought in with him.

            “Mick, did you get-” her words stop abruptly and her eyes widen as she takes in the woman standing in front of her husband. “Is that Beck? Oh my God, girl! I didn’t even recognize you! We literally just saw your new movie!” It takes a moment for Mick’s brain to register the fact that Celine and Beck went to school together, back when he’d dated her and they’d all gone on double dates. That, and the fact that he’s only now remembering Celine’s words before the movie. He’d been distracted buying drinks, had mumbled along as if he’d been paying attention, as she’d informed him that Beck was the love interest. He can clearly hear her now, in his memories, babbling excitedly that she used to do French reports with a celebrity.

 He looks between them and can see the surprise on Beck’s face change to disbelief, her eyes wide as they make their way back to him, looking as if she’s holding back from being physically ill right in front of everyone.

            “Celine, hey!” Her voice is strained as she hugs Celine, careful of the pregnant belly jutting out between them. “Wow you look great! I didn’t know you married Calv-…Mick.” Her eyes settle on Chase and Mick has to look away from the wetness her eyes suddenly adopt. “Or had a son. Almost two, oh my God, so much has happened since I’ve been away.”

            “Obviously! Look at this emerald!” Celine takes Beck’s hand in her own and examines the ring with gusto. It pains Mick, Celine not understanding the full history between them. She knew they’d dated years ago, obviously she’d been there, but he’d never told anyone the reason they’d broken up. Celine knew no reason for jealousy, nor of her husbands’ wandering mind for the last month and a half.

            He listens intently, once again using his feigning ability to act uninterested, as the two women do a quick catch-up on all that’s been going on. Celine’s pregnancy, “It’s a girl this time!”, Beck’s fame and engagement, “Lennan is a Godsend” (he doesn’t miss how she shifts her weight further from him as she says this, arms tightening around her chest as she does so), and eventually come around to why Beck is back in town after so long.

            “I don’t come home often. I usually fly my parents to Washington to see me, especially for the holidays to see some snow. Lennan came by himself last year to ask mom for a family heirloom ring to propose with. I’m only back now for their thirtieth-year anniversary, hence the cake. Lennan wants to use my parents’ old rings for ours since they’re getting new ones for the ceremony. Hopes it’ll bring luck to our marriage.” Her voice cracks, making her clear her throat as she smiles at Celine.

            Mick’s arms grow tired with the weight of the cake and he shifts but doesn’t dare set it down. He can tell by the way Beck glances at him that she’s enjoying his discomfort. He was never allowed to hold things for her, she’d preferred to do almost everything herself, but after what he’d done and the way she’d found him after so many years...he knew the old her well enough to know that she’d forgo independence long enough to punish him in some small way.

            The interaction ends with Celine and Beck planning a girls’ night out before Beck turns to leave, Mick telling Celine he would be back in as soon as he helped deliver the cake to Beck’s car.

            The walk is silent until the cake is safely inside the old family Honda. Mick briefly notes, impressed, that the car still runs.

            Once the door is slammed with a little too much force, Beck turns to him, the smile across her lips tight, eyes misty.

            “Safe to say I was smart to stay away as long as I did.” Her voice shakes, not unlike his heart as she almost spits the words.

            “Beck, I-”

            “It’s Jethra. It’s weird and I love it. I fell in love with it after I had to fall in love with myself again after you-” She takes a deep breath, steadying herself, her smile gone. “No one’s called me Beck since…” Her words are quieter as she shakes her head, not needing to finish her sentence.

            “Jethra...” The name tastes odd on his tongue. “I…” Mick tries to find the words; desperately wanting to prolong their encounter, but nothing comes. His hands hang limply at his sides as his eyes search her face and he’s struck by how much he misses gazing into her eyes.

            “There’s nothing for you to say, Calvin. Except the part where you explain to me why the _hell_ you are married to Celine. With a _child?_ What does Wyatt think about this?”

            A new pang of guilt rushes over Mick at the mention of his brother. It makes him hang his head and stare at the sun-bleached tarmac under his feet.

            “Wyatt hasn’t spoken to me in five years.”

            He hears the intake of breath and can’t keep himself from looking at her face. The rage he finds there is unfiltered, her voice hoarse as she chokes out “Your son…he’s…”

            Mick nods. “He’ll turn six in November.”

            Beck scoffs, hands on her hips as she turns away from him, staring into the sky like it holds the answers she seeks. When she turns back to him she simply says, “I hate you.”

            He flinches at the malice in her voice, the pain of those three words a complete foil to the three words she used to say to him.

            He just nods. “I know.”

            “No you don’t know. After Henry died, you were all Wyatt had. And now he has no one. You two are all that’s left of that family and you…” There are tears now and Mick can’t understand why she’s so upset over his brother and he says as much.

            “You just don’t think about anyone but yourself, Cal. _That’s_ why I’m so mad. After I gave you everything, _everything I had_ , and Wyatt gave you everything, you still have to _take_ until there’s nothing left. I can’t…I can’t deal with this right now. I wish you all the luck in the world.” The last words are like a knife, straight to his heart and just as damaging, as she gets in the car and drives off, leaving him standing in the sun until he retreats back to the life he’d dealt himself, words he’d once said to her stuck in his brain and he instantly knows what replayed in her mind six years ago.

 

            It’s four days after their encounter, two after Beck drops Celine off after their catch-up dinner, that there’s a knock on the door. Celine and Chase are off at her parents for the weekend, an invitation that Mick had declined, opting to stay home and wallow alone.

            When he opens the door, the last person he expects to see is Beck, a bag in her hand, two more suspended beneath her eyes. Her hair is styled this time, outfit closer to what he’d expected after viewing her photos online for the last few weeks; a printed blouse tucked loosely into dark denim jeans cuffed at the bottom to show off wedges impractical for the unforgiving landscape their hometown offers.

            “I came to apologize.” Her words are stiff and he can tell she’s only putting herself through this sort of emotional pain because that’s just who she is: self-sacrificing to the point he’s surprised she’d never been called The Giving Tree.

            Silently, he ushers her in, watches as she shrinks a few inches as she carefully steps out of her shoes at the door. They look odd amongst Chases’ child shoes and the sneakers and flats Celine had switched to for the sake of an easier motherhood chasing after their son.

            Mick leads them into the kitchen; a seemingly safe space. They’re quiet for a moment until he offers her a drink which she politely declines.

            “I’m not here for long. Just to drop off some things. I wanted to tell you how stupid you are about the whole Wyatt situation but you have a beautiful family and I’m sure you’re reminded by your life decisions every day. Who am I to say anything?”

            Mick nods, not trusting his words at the moment.

            “In the bag is your shirt, freshly washed. There’s also an envelope in there containing all the letters I wrote to you and never sent. It’s a good therapy exercise and it helped. Surprisingly.” Her laugh is dry, humorless. He watches as she fidgets with her fingers, twisting her engagement ring around, consciously not looking around at the pictures hung on the fridge, the high chair pushed in the corner. He watches her and realizes that over the last few weeks, he’s fallen in love with her again.

            “I love you.”

            The words are out before he can stop them and she freezes, a deer caught in headlights. Her eyes widen before they narrow. “I told you once that I finally found the lie in all the half-truths. Don’t make me find another.”

            He reaches a hand to her, effectively pushing her further away. “Beck I didn’t-”

            She raises her voice over his as she recoils from him, taking a physical step back. “Just read the letters and then throw them away. It took me a long time to forgive you, don’t make me regret it. And don’t lie to your wife, she deserves better than you. She deserves Wyatt.” Tears are falling now and she turns to leave. He hears her quick steps towards the front door, can hear the absence of a pause as she grabs her shoes up and runs out the door, not caring that it slams shut behind her.

            He repeats history as he stands there, his pride a barrier between him and the path he should take to run after her. The path he knows now is definitely a dead end.

            An hour has passed, the tumbler is back out on the counter and he’s two drinks in before he pulls the thick envelope from the bag. It’s taped shut, a rip across the tip of the flap showing where it’d been opened. Carefully, he removes each letter and reads through them.

            Each one is dated, every day for the first month after he’d slammed the door in her face. The words start out big, sometimes filling up two lines instead of one, steadily decreasing, along with her emotions, until he can clearly read each and every word she’d written him.

            He reads all of the truths she’d wanted to tell him, all of the bad things about himself she knew that he refused to accept. He reads through the tears stains and the cross-outs. He reads until he gets to the last one and sees three words across the middle of a blank sheet of paper, dated for today.

 

 

**Call your brother**

Even though it takes him another hour to argue with himself and admit that she’s right-yet again-he picks up the phone and dials Wyatt. Looking at the clock and realizing it’s about 2 a.m. in New York, he’s surprised when his brother answers on the fourth ring. There’s a muffled _what do you want?_ On the other end by way of greeting. It takes Mick a few seconds to react, to breathe, to gather enough courage to actually speak and not just hang up.

            “Hey, Wyatt…I’m…I’m sorry.”

            He slides a hand over his face, feeling tears he couldn’t remember shedding as he hears his baby brothers’ voice over the phone sigh. “It’s about time.”

            He can’t help but let out a choked laugh.

           

**Author's Note:**

> Okay guys! 
> 
> Whew! So, for my Love and Courage fans, if you are reading this, thank you for the support and a thousand apologies for the length of time the update is taking! BUT I AM CURRENTLY WORKING ON IT! Creativity flows once again but I found this from a local short story competition and this was this years entry. It won me third place and I figured that since the last comment I got on this site was from my other original work I didn't think it would hurt to post it.
> 
> Background- This was what came of my rage and hurt after being dumped earlier this year. I recovered very quickly despite specific details of the relationship and am happier now than I have ever been. This story holds either similarities to me and my ex or complete foils of us (i.e. physical appearances, family, etc.) Basically this is...not necessarily my hopes for the future but something I would love to just KNOW happened to him (literally just the opening scene, I don't want him screwing up his or his brothers' life-- putting that out there) 
> 
> Enough rambling (my God why do I do this, forgive me). I really hope you enjoy this :) Feel free to give creative criticism or comments, I accept anything and everything that will make me stronger as a writer. Thank you for all the support I have gotten (because at this point if you're reading this you've supported me in just giving your time!) and will hopefully continue to receive.


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